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Trayvon messages prompt Bunnell police probe

Published: Wednesday, August 21, 2013 at 8:33 p.m.

Last Modified: Wednesday, August 21, 2013 at 9:57 p.m.

The Bunnell Police Department has opened an internal investigation to determine whether one of its officers was involved in an exchange of Trayvon Martin comments that recently led to the firing of a Volusia County beach officer.

Martinez confirmed Wednesday that a case on the Trayvon messages is open, then declined to discuss it any further.

“I can't make any comments on

anything while the IA's open,” Martinez said Wednesday afternoon.

Hoffman, who had previously said the city did not have enough information to look into the issue, said none of his officers are on paid or unpaid leave during the investigation, and he didn't have a timetable for its completion.

Bunnell's inquiry follows Volusia's, which began last month following a complaint from someone who saw the Trayvon comments — either on Facebook or in a thread of picture messages sent to several law enforcement officers' cellphones.

Beach Safety Officer Todd Snipes, who posted “r.i.p. thug” on Facebook shortly after the George Zimmerman not-guilty verdict, was fired three weeks later. He's hired a lawyer and is appealing the firing.

The first message in that picture-message thread was a cartoon of Trayvon in a hoodie, holding Skittles with text that read: “Those Skittles were to die for.” The sender wasn't identified — only a phone number. The phone number was still a working number last week, although calls went to voicemail. It was no longer working Wednesday.

The Skittles cartoon came from someone Snipes identified only as “Shane,” according to Volusia's investigation. Snipes said he didn't know Shane's last name.

When the phone number was run through a reverse-lookup program, it was identified as belonging to a Shane Groth.

The Bunnell Police Department has an officer named Shane Groth.

After the Volusia investigation closed, however, Hoffman told The News-Journal that “none of my employees were identified in the Beach Patrol investigation, and I still do not have information that would allow me to proceed with a lawful investigation on any of my employees.”

The newspaper told Hoffman its search of the phone number resulted in Groth's name. Hoffman replied: “So I now have some information that I can proceed with which I did not have before.” He said he hadn't discussed the issue with Groth yet, but would at some point.

Hoffman also pointed to the new social media policy, enacted a few days after Snipes' firing, as evidence he didn't take the matter lightly.

Groth hasn't returned messages and The News-Journal has been unsuccessful in its attempts to interview him at Bunnell City Hall.

He was hired as a Bunnell officer in June. Before that, Groth was a reserve police officer in Daytona Beach, where Hoffman was a captain before he took the Bunnell chief's job.

A Daytona Beach police spokesman said the only written reprimand in Groth's personnel file involved a time he accidentally fired his gun in the locker room. He was first runner-up for Daytona's 2012 part-time officer of the year.

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